Liar, Lover, Legend
by The Quiller
Summary: /He was never meant to be a hero, but she has caught him, caged him, and for that, he will never forgive her. "You said you would cry for me, but, Empress? You're on the wrong side of this grave for that."/ Phantom's journey, from liar to lover to legend. [Phantom x Aria, Legends Friendship]
1. Prologue

. . .

**Liar, Lover, and Legend**

. . .

_Prologue_

. . .

_'Brat. Do you want to live?' asks a man with a cloak as black as raven's wings and a smile as fickle as the moon._

_'I don't want to die,' answers the ghost-child with eyes of amethyst blue._

_'But do you want to **live**?'_

_'...I want to live.'_

_'Then follow me, and don't look back.'_

. . .

A phantom thief must preserve their own legend of invincibility above all else.

The moment that legend shatters, a phantom thief is a phantom no more – only a common criminal, one who can be caught, chained, and killed. He must remain more than mortal, beyond the impossible, safe in the realm of myth and mystery. In Master Raven's words, _"Even if you must swallow your own blood, smile through clenched teeth and never let them see a drop of it."_ A phantom sheds neither blood nor tears. He is only ever charming, mysterious, and whimsical. Ageless. Nameless. Fearless. Free. He fights his battles clad in immaculate white, taunting the world that cannot lay a finger on him, no matter how many blades, arrows, or spells they hurl at him.

It is a lie, of course. He is still made of flesh and blood. He can bleed. He can die.

But they must not see it.

Master Raven lives and dies by that creed. Even burned beyond recognition and bleeding where the blast has stripped the flesh from his bones, the man still makes it home and lives just long enough to name his successor. The newly named Master Thief burns the body and places his master's bones in an unmarked grave. Whereas the ancient kings of Ariant raised great pyramids and even the lowliest peasants have their bodies embalmed for their next life, the Lord of Thieves has nothing in death, not even a name. There is no love lost between master and pupil, but for the first time in his life, Phantom kneels, touching his lips to the earth in utmost respect. It is to acknowledge that this will be how his own legend begins.

This, too, will be how his own legend ends. Phantom thieves do not live long lives nor die peaceful deaths.

But he doesn't hesitate. His hands are steady as he pulls his master's black raven mask over hair still streaked with sand and ashes. It fits onto his face snugly and he feels his lips curl into that iconic smirk of taunting, arrogant invincibility, the same one he has seen on a dead man's lips time and time again. Perhaps, if someone looks closely, they'll notice that the face behind the mask is younger, the shoulders less broad, and the limbs lankier, but the rich bastards celebrating his demise are too stunned at his reappearance to notice. In that moment, gazing at their gaping expressions, his decision is made. A true master thief would never give these men the satisfaction of knowing they had finally struck him down. And so, when he opens his mouth to speak, it is his master's voice he mimics, burying the last of his own identity forever.

_"Did you really think you would be rid of me so easily? I find your lack of faith disappointing."_

The Heart Diamond is never seen again, squirreled away in some hidden vault of the greatest thief of all time. He flaunts it, mocks them with it, and never tells a soul that the 'vault' is only an unmarked grave somewhere deep in the Ariant desert along with a pile of bones and ashes. The man buried there has no name.

That name belongs to him now. He is the Master Thief, the Raven – Phantom.

To the world, he is an enigma, so far beyond their ability to capture that they can step back and admire his performance for what it is. He is a man made of moonlight and lies, vengeance upon the corrupt, victory to the oppressed, scoundrel and savior rolled into one. He is faerie-blooded and demon-hearted. He many more strange and fantastic things besides if the stories are to be believed. People see what they wish to see and hear what they wish to hear. They can admire his fearless justice and praise his bottomless generosity. They can chase him in their fevered rage, but never even come close to catching the hem of his cape. His golden smile never wavers. He slips right through their fingers in a taunting swirl of cards and laughter, just as his legend claims he can.

No one knows how thin that mask of invincibility really is or how closely he dances on an edge of a grave. The stories of his impossible skill will never reveal how the phantom thief reappears in the ceiling rafters, too exhausted to go any further and bruised all over, where he must stay perfectly still for two entire days before he spots a chance to escape in a barrel of kitchen scraps. The romantics will never mention how he crawls out of the filth hours later, utterly sick of the smell of onion and vowing unholy vengeance on fermented beans. And the stories of his chivalry and heroism will never include the bastard grin that slowly stretches from ear to ear as he draws the jeweled pendant out of his pocket and feels the sight set his blood on fire.

Phantom does not steal to punish the wicked rich or save the dying poor. If such a noble cause had been his only motivation, he would have burned out long before now. No, he steals because it makes his blood sing and his heart roar, because his life burns so brightly against the night that it cannot last - he wants to live every moment to its fullest.

Even if he lies to the world, Phantom must be honest with himself. He is no self-sacrificing martyr. He is a thief, a scoundrel, and a madman, addicted to thrill and destined for hellfire. He will always remember that there is only a nameless grave waiting for him at the end of the road.

But he will be laughing all the way there.

. . .

A young woman waits on a moonlit balcony high above the troubled world below.

Her new station leaves her feeling frail and fragile, as if someone has scraped away her insides and left behind only a thin, hollow shell of her former self. The holy power of the divine bird fills her veins now, an endless ocean of calm and wisdom that smooths away all the rough edges of her personality. Shinsoo's all-pervading calm unsettles her. She hasn't shed a single tear for mother or father yet, even though a part of her wants to rage and scream her grief for all the world to see.

She misses the foolish, rash girl she once was.

She no longer runs barefoot through the palace gardens with mud up to her knees, nor does she compete with the servant boys to see who can spit watermelons seeds the farthest. Her little sister no longer comes to her in the middle of the night with tears and nightmares to soothe away. The knights that once snarked back at her whenever she lashed out with her sharp tongue now bow to her without meeting her eyes. The worst part is that nothing is stopping her but herself – she can run through the gardens and spit all watermelon seeds she wants - but those things have lost their joy. Shinsoo's ancient wisdom is a constant echo in her soul that makes her feel so much older than she should be. The once brilliant world around her has faded into gray.

Deep inside, part of her rails against her fate. She's not ready to let go of her passion and be the wise and impartial ruler of the world. There's so much she still wants to do. She wants to dance like no one's watching and laugh like no one's listening. She wants to see all the messy corners of the world and stain them onto her memories. She wants to fall in love with a man who will wring both tears of joy and tears of sorrow from her heart.

Emperors can live for centuries; she feels as if the light of her life has been dimmed to a bare flicker to make her last longer. She'll run out of laughter and tears too soon otherwise. Her new-found heart is as calm and vast as the ocean, unchanging, unyielding, and unshakeable, and the girl she used to be is drowning in it. In a few years, a few decades, what will be left?

So she hopes against hope that somehow, before she loses herself completely, she will find something or someone that will bring all the color back into her world. Something that can strip away all the trappings of the throne and find the silly girl with muddy knees that she has misplaced.

On a moonlit balcony, a young woman listens to the wind and longs for freedom.

. . .

_Author's Note:_

_Buckle in for a long ride, because this story is going to go from before Phantom meets Aria all the way to the final fate of the heroes being sealed in ice, with a lot of world-building and ignoring canon in between._

_i) We know from Phantom's 2nd Job quests that Phantom is originally from Ariant and learned under a master thief named Raven. Raven died in a failed bomb defusing. Considering how Phantom's hat is called 'Raven Persona' in the game, I put two and two together and came up with a legacy of the phantom thieves, a name passed down from master to student, because it's just more romantic and dramatic that way._

_ii) Regarding Aria - if Cygnus is her niece, then two things have to be true: Aria must at least one sibling, and royalty lives a really, really long time. Given that Aria seems older and less frail than Cygnus, I'm guessing she has had some time to adjust to Shinsoo by the time she meets Phantom. In keeping with that theory, something bad must have happened to Aria's parents, especially if their lifespans are extended._

_Anyway, reviews are desperately desired, and any ideas or corrections you want me to put into this story would be awesome._

_Enjoy and review!_


	2. Act I part i - Liar

. . .

_Act I – Liar  
part (i)_

. . .

_Masks and Myths_

. . .

_'I am glad you are feeling more like yourself again, sir,' murmurs a black-clad butler bowing neatly at the waist._

_The silver thief only quirks an eyebrow, asking, 'When am I not myself?'_

_'Vengeance and heroics both ill suit you,' the butler murmurs quietly._

_A rare flash of a smile - a true smile, not a smirk - tugs at the master's lips._

_'Touché, Gaston. I'll remember that.'_

. . .

Phantom is a master actor, a one man show that has captivated the world. His life is an unending string of narrow escapes, impossible stunts, and torrid romances that make it impossible to look away – which is the entire point, really. He adores the attention and always goes the extra mile to put on a good show.

But in the end, it's just a show. He plays up the chivalrous and gallant angle for the fun of it, but the master thief isn't a hero and never plans to be. All those silly rules heroes follow – protect the weak, obey the law, and live honorably – mean nothing to him. The newspapers can argue about his heroism or villainy all they want. The reality is that Phantom simply doesn't care.

He follows only one rule: take nothing that is beyond his power to return. He does not maim. He does not rape. He does not kill. Phantom refuses to do anything he might regret and not have the power to undo. The greatest treasure of a phantom thief is a world with no limits. If he ever wants something badly enough to kill for it or die for it, then he has chained himself to it, and a thief weighed down by desires is as good as dead. He must always remember that it is only ever an act.

Ironic how, the first time Phantom breaks character is to protect the same character he has presented to the world. His cruelest theft cements his heroism and dooms him to an Empress's gratitude.

It begins with a heist gone wrong.

He knows something is very, very wrong from the moment he sets foot onto the Vicar's estate. There should have been guards, dogs, wards – he sent his calling card weeks ago – but the mansion is as quiet as a grave.

It is only when he steps into the antechamber supposedly housing the seven Pearls of Lutra and finds the display case smashed that he realizes what has happened. The Vicar lays at the foot of the empty pedestal with his throat slashed and his blood pooling on the marble floor. The guards are equally bloody messes, their corpses studded with very familiar looking playing cards. There is no time to alter the scene; the entire affair is staged and timed impeccably. The same instant the spell wards slam down on the mansion to trap him in the antechamber, the distant clamor of imperial knights breaking down the front gates reaches his ears.

But whoever staged this has underestimated the Master Thief. A four-layered containment spell and an entire company of knights are not enough to trap him. It costs Phantom a grueling crawl through the smoke vents, a dislocated shoulder, and a ruined suit, but Phantom makes it back to the Lumiere with a fake playing card cutting into his hand and a cold fury sinking into his heart.

Bounties. Slander. Ambushes. Assassins. With each successful heist, his pursuers resort to more and more desperate measures. Phantom has easily forgiven even their nastiest tricks with nothing more than a few mocking taunts. It's all just a game on his part, just lighthearted pranks on stuffy old men who take things way too seriously, even though he is the one betting his life. No one else gets hurt – that was his only rule.

Now, the words '_Nineteen Dead in Latest Phantom Heist!' _are splashed across the headlines of every newspaper, followed by frenzied speculations about what made the Master Thief finally snap. Now, Phantom bitterly regrets his leniency to those stuffy old men.

They have learned to despise him, but they have not learned to be afraid. After all, though he may bleed their coffers dry, he has never drawn a drop of their blood. Maybe, if they were not so sure of their own physical safety, they would not have dared to use Phantom as a scapegoat for political assassination.

Nineteen deaths with his signet mark painted in their blood.

When he finally traces the fake playing card back to the Duke of Ossyria, he is still angry, far too angry to stop himself. Duke Krogh is a feared tyrant, one of the most powerful men alive with a reputation for utterly decimating those that stand against him. He commands enough armed forces to rule his vast territories with an iron fist and owns enough informants to subvert even one of Phantom's heists. Cunning, cruel, and cold, Krogh is a dangerous of enemy to make.

But Krogh has made one fatal mistake. He has deemed the Master Thief a less dangerous enemy than his political rivals and operates under the assumption that wealth is the only thing Phantom can steal from him.

There is _nothing_ Phantom cannot steal. Only things he chooses not to. He is more dangerous to Krogh than Krogh will ever be to him. It's easy to win when you don't play by the rules. Phantom only ever obeyed one rule, and Krogh has just made him angry enough to break it.

The duke wakes in the middle of the night to a violet-eyed silhouette in his room, in his keep, in the most secure heart of his fortress. To his credit, Krogh does not scream. Instead, the man makes a show of demanding answers while groping for the crossbow hidden beneath the nightstand.

_"You should have picked a better hiding place for your secrets before you decided to borrow my name for murder,"_ the silhouette whispers before it scatters away in a swirl of cards, just as a crossbow bolt sprouts from the wall behind where its head would have been.

Predictably, Krogh goes straight to his study and unlocks the hidden drawer in his desk to make sure that Phantom's threat is empty. Nothing is missing – all the damning evidence of his less than legal dealings remain safely guarded secrets. He allows himself a sigh of relief -

A sigh that is choked off in the very next instant by a vice-like hold that is far, far stronger than Phantom's slender build would imply. The Master Thief is calm and methodical, his trademark smirk eerily absent from his face as Krogh flails. The choke-hold lasts a bit longer after Krogh goes limp, just to be sure, but ultimately, Phantom lets him go. He steps over Krogh's prone but breathing body and empties the drawer. Even this far gone, Phantom is a thief, not a killer, and that is a line he does not want to cross tonight.

Gazing down at the man he is about to ruin, though, he realizes just how fine that line is.

The next morning, the Empress finds a large package sitting on her desk with a famously patterned playing card pinned to it that tells her all she needs to know about its origins. When she has sorted through the exhaustive collection of documents and evidence, she sends her knights to the duke's estate. There, they find the man trussed up like a turkey in his own vaults with a crown bearing the seven Pearls of Lutra perched mockingly on top of his head. The rest of the vaults are empty.

On the day that the man is executed for the murders originally blamed on Phantom, the villagers of Ossyria awaken to a miracle. Bags of gold, bushels of wheat, sacks of grain and potatoes, cured meats, bales of cotton and hay, barrels of wine – everything in the Duke's warehouses – are stacked high in every town square across the dukedom. It isn't generosity; Phantom has emptied out Krogh's warehouses as a final act of spite for the man before his anger finally wanes.

The rest of the world, however, doesn't see it that way. For the first time, their praise is more than a whisper of gratitude in the dead of night or murmurs of satisfaction in a seedy bar. The danger is gone; they sing his praises openly in the streets, no matter how undeserved the praise may be.

Unbeknownst to Phantom, it is this act of supposed generosity that finally tips the Empress from secret admiration into active curiosity.

Not even a week later, word of greatest the treasure of Ereve reaches his ears. Never mind that no one has ever seen it and not even his extensive information networks can pinpoint where it is kept.

At any other point of his life, he would have laughed it off as a hoax and picked a more realistic target, but the current Phantom has not yet regained his balance after tipping so dangerously towards vengeance. Before, praise for his heroic actions only delighted him. But right now, nineteen people are still dead, and he has all but tied the noose around Krogh's neck with his own two hands. If this is what it really means to be a hero, then the burden is too heavy. Never again, Phantom decides, and sets out to remind the world that he is a thief first and a hero, never.

A hero would never rob the kind and generous Empress. A master thief, however, will find the lure of the Skaia irresistible. No one before him was capable of such a feat, and no one after him will be able to top it. The greatest thief of all time – he likes the sound of it.

He never doubts that he can find it. The Empress is famed for her kindness and generosity, but she is likewise beloved for her youth and naivety. A sheltered girl who has never set foot outside her castle in the sky is no match for a master thief whose head is wanted in every nation in world. His charm is as deadly as his cards. She will tell him where the Skaia is from her own lips, and once he knows, no power in the world will be able to keep it from him.

With smile in place and rose in hand, Phantom goes to meet the Empress of Ereve.

It is the beginning of the end.

. . .

_Author's Note:_

_i) There's a major continuity snarl in Phantom's crew. If Phantom was frozen for centuries, his crew either had to be frozen with him, or a different crew from his original. From the quest dialogue, the majority of the crew are very clearly from the modern Maple world, and yet Gaston seems to know Phantom far too well to be newly hired. Thus, I've decided on a compromise...which means there will be some heart-breaking and heart-warming scenes for Phantom later in this story._

_ii) According to the level 200 Phantom quest, 'the Truth About Skaia', you find out from Aria's diary that Skaia was never real - she made it up in order to lure Phantom into meeting with her. Hence Phantom's words to Hilla during his introductory video: 'A true Empress would know that the Skaia you hold is a ruse, a bauble, dressed up to lure the great thief Phantom out of hiding.'  
_

_Next chapter, Aria finally appears. Cue the romance.  
_

_Review and let me know what you think, or if you have ideas/corrections for me to include!_


	3. Act I part ii - Liar

. . .

_Act I – Liar  
part (ii)_

. . .

_Entrapment  
_

. . .

Somewhere along the line, exaggeration has become widely accepted fact. Phantom can supposedly charm birds from their trees and win the heart of any maiden in three days or less. The man himself isn't quite sure if he should be flattered or a bit offended by the sheer number of people claiming romantic affairs with the master thief.

He loves to live up to his own legend, though, because no one else can get away with it. He flirts outrageously and lavishes his attention extravagantly. Once, he has an entire castle moat filled with roses, and another time, he carpets an entire town in seven tons of confetti. Whether they are interested in him or not, Phantom makes himself impossible to ignore.

But it is his subtlety, not his blatancy, which makes him truly dangerous. The arrogant, devastatingly handsome gentleman thief is never a surprise, but the soft-spoken lover with gentle eyes and tender attention to detail always catches them off guard. So does the passionate dreamer whose lips taste like freedom, as well as the carefree youth with a laugh as warm as sunlight. Every persona comes to him easily because every single one is a part of who he really is. He is a lover with a thousand faces. It's frighteningly easy to convince people that they have seen the real man behind the myth and captured the heart of the elusive thief.

They only ever catch a tiny sliver of the whole. It's never enough to make Phantom linger. When the heist is complete, he bids farewell, sometimes with smiles, sometimes with tears, and sometimes with just a single rose on their pillow and a lingering kiss on their lips. He leaves them with nothing but a glimpse of the truth, just one of the many faces hidden behind his mask, but never enough for them to truly understand, and never enough to make him stay.

No matter how much he loves, he will always love freedom more. Phantom never gives away so much of his heart that he cannot take it back.

Then he meets an Empress who makes him trade for every piece of her heart and accepts nothing less than an equal piece of his. Little by little, she catches him, cages him, and steals away his will to flee. This is how Fate humbles the proud.

When she dies, there is no one left to set him free.

. . .

He will always remember Aria the way he first saw her, standing on a moonlit balcony with the wind playing through her ridiculously long hair.

That very first night, he takes a moment to watch her on the balcony before he reveals himself. She is exactly how he expects an Empress to be: graceful, elegant, and dangerously easy to love at first sight. She is beautiful enough to make a dying man breathe easy, or to catch a master thief off guard if he hadn't mentally prepared himself for it. Her face is young but her brow is creased with worry, exactly how a kind and gentle empress in troubled times ought to look.

But Phantom is unmoved by beauty. His type leans more towards red hair and curves anyway. With a silent leap and a flick of golden playing cards, he materializes on her balcony railing, balancing precariously on the ledge as he greets her.

"Don't tell me you've been out here waiting for me all night." Everything is carefully staged, from the whimsical tone of his voice to the angle of the moonlight half illuminating his features. He, too, will be just as expected – mysterious, charismatic, and roguishly handsome.

Even her surprised gasp and heel-face turn are graceful movements, fluid rather than sudden, and her wide blue eyes soften the moment she sees him. His eyes are too sharp to miss the faint glimmer of a smile that ghosts over her lips as she asks, "Shall I summon the guard?"

"Only if you don't want me here," he says.

No guard is summoned, and Phantom graciously accepts the unspoken invitation. A quick glance shows that she stands straight with her shoulders relaxed, but her eyes never stray from his face. An unafraid, unguarded, and curious stance, Phantom's experienced eye discerns. He allows a pleased grin to twitch across his lips. In that case, might as well go full tilt from the very beginning.

He covers the distance between them in a confident stride and stops just a bit too close to be entirely proper. Then he drops to one knee and extends his hand to her with palm upturned – he suspects she offers her own hand out of reflex more than actual consent – but he brushes a textbook gentleman's kiss over her slender fingers all the same. Finally, he raises his eyes to meet hers and flashes his most devastating smile for critical effect.

"You are as beautiful as they say, Empress."

"I'm glad I don't disappoint," she says, "but don't you usually announce your visits?"

No giggle, no blush, no false modesty, and no pointless pleasantries. Clearly, the Empress is not an easily flustered woman. He has underestimated her - standard tactics are not going to work. Without missing a beat, Phantom changes strategies. Seduction isn't the only way to trick information out of someone.

"Only for official business. This is a personal visit. I owe you a thank you, Empress."

"What for?"

"For clearing my name. I didn't relish being a murderer," he says, rising to his feet. He is a good head and a half taller than her, and standing this close together, she has to tilt her chin upwards in order to look him in the eye. It gives him an excellent view of her entire face as she hears his next words.

"I don't give my gratitude lightly, and let it never be said that Phantom doesn't repay favors." He holds up a single finger between them, smiles as if he's sharing a precious secret, and says, "So just once, Empress, you may ask of me anything you desire. If it's within reason, I'll do everything in my power to grant it."

There. The hook is baited.

She blinks. Then she says, "You don't need to thank me for doing my job. If anything, I should be thanking you for doing most of it for me."

And the bait is ignored. She does it so nonchalantly that Phantom can't help but laugh. After the unpleasantness of the entire Krogh affair, he realizes how much he has missed this kind of harmless verbal sparring. He wonders if she's this blunt with her court. If so, it's no wonder so many nobles are so frustrated lately.

"Don't give up your advantages so quickly. You'll never win at cards with that kind of mindset," he says.

"I don't play cards," she says.

"Au contraire. Everyone plays cards – we make the best of the hand we're dealt by fate," he says. "My offer stands. Think about it." Then, with his raised index finger, he reaches out and taps her on the nose, something no one else would dare to do to the sovereign ruler of Maple World. She stares at the offending finger in surprise, but there really isn't an appropriate response for such a thing. The look on her face is the most amusing thing he's seen in a while. He makes a mental note to do it again when she's least expecting it.

In the end, she pretends it simply didn't happen. Regaining her composure, she says, "In that case, I'd like an honest answer to my question."

"As long as it doesn't compromise any interests, certainly."

"Why do you steal?"

To say he is underwhelmed would be an understatement. Raising an eyebrow at her, he says, "You realize you could have asked me for any treasure in existence, and I could have gotten it for you? Any secret in any book, any place you wanted to go, anything you wanted me to do for you? Are you sure about this?"

"Yes. Why do you steal?" she repeats.

"A thousand reasons, really. Because it's fun. Because I can. Because I'm good at it. Because there are a lot of people who own a lot of things they don't deserve to have." He pauses for a moment and wonders if he should just stop there – he promised her an honest answer, but not necessarily a complete one. By the look on her face, though, it doesn't seem like she'll let him get away with just this much. Sighing, he admits, "Mostly, because I never cared much for rules about what I can and can't do."

"So in essence, you steal because you want to?" she says.

He grins ruefully and says, "I'm sorry I don't have a more suitably heroic reason for you. You _did_ ask for honesty."

To his surprise, though, she laughs. It's a small sound a first, muffled and nearly inaudible, as if she is out of practice. Then she laughs out loud, a pure, musical sound that carries well across the moonlit balcony. It's a girl's laugh, not a smothered noblewoman's giggle, and Phantom feels his own lips tug upwards at the sound even if he doesn't quite understand what she finds so funny.

"I apologize," she says when she finally has a hold of herself again. "It's just that, after so much speculation, the truth really is just that simple."

"Disappointed?"

"No," she says, and smiles beatifically, the kind of smile that can take root in a man's heart if he isn't careful. "That was the best reason I could have hoped for."

"I'm always happy to please," he says. "I'm glad that ended well. If you'll excuse me, I have a few more stops to make before the sun comes up."

"Oh." She doesn't quite manage to hide the disappointment on her face. "You're not going to ask about Skaia?"

He tips his hat towards her politely and says, "Like I said, Empress, this was a purely personal visit. Fear not, I don't give up on things I've set my eyes on, no matter how likeable their owners turn out to be. We'll be seeing more of each other soon, your Highness."

Then, just to indulge himself, he taps her on the nose once more before vanishing in a flurry of cards, and hears a brief snatch of musical laughter just before the balcony swirls away.

. . .

_Author's Note:_

_Firstly, this chapter is brought to you by my awesome beta-reader, Kaist! If you enjoy this story, I highly recommend taking a look at 'Scattered Ashes', Kaist's F!Evan fanfiction because the quality puts me to shame and has a whole lot of Phantom goodness._

_i) There have been several edits to the previous chapter, most notably Gaston's name. I just discovered that Gaston is more commonly used as a last name, not a first name, which has potential I shall exploit._

_ii) I'm also taking suggestions for Phantom's real name. It'll only be used once, but I suck at making up names. Keep in mind it should be Ariant-themed though._

_Anyway, if you enjoyed it, please leave me a review! If you hated it, please leave me a review. In short, REVIEW please~_


	4. Act I part iii - Liar

. . .

_Act I – Liar  
part (iii)_

. . .

_Speaking Silence_

. . .

He is her only selfish indulgence, her wayward knight, and her dearest kept secret. No one will ever know just how many times Phantom has stolen her life right out of the reaper's hands. To the rest of the world, the Empress seems invincible and untouchable, protected by divine favor when all other defenses fail.

There is, of course, no such thing – just a crafty thief with sharp eyes and quick hands who would rather not see her come to harm.

"_Just passing through,_" he says sometimes. _"Consider it a favor."_ "_Oh, was I interrupting something? My apologies._" "_Can't just let someone else run off with my ticket to Skaia, now can I?"_ _"I'd hate to make a beautiful woman cry."_ He has as many excuses as there are stars in the sky. Master thieves are liars by nature. Even with a foiled assassin twitching at his feet, he lies brazenly to her face and never says what he really means. The words never quite make it past his lips.

That's alright, because she hears them all the same. And though the words never quite make it past her lips either, he can hear them too. In between the quiet _'thank you'_s, the shared laughter, the bated breath and rushing heartbeats, they hear those unspoken words as clear as day.

_I love you._

_I love you, so please don't die._

. . .

Yet, the very first time she nearly dies, he isn't there. Instead, he is a thousand miles away, stealing first edition children's books on a whim.

He hasn't spared her a single thought since their first meeting until he picks up the morning paper and reads the headline _'Empress Injures Leg in Riding Accident'_. All it prompts from him is a brief laugh, and then an order for his butler to pick up some flowers on their way back to Ereve. He's looking forward to finding out if their lovely monarch is any easier to ruffle after such an embarrassing injury.

He shows up on her balcony with a fetching bouquet of red roses – no one else would dare imply such blatant romantic interest. Their bright and bold color is sure to stand out against all the more traditional flowers she must have received. Fully expecting a rather bored empress confined to bed rest, he steps into her room with a head full of witty comments to tease and entertain.

What he finds is a deathly still room that smells like blood and antiseptic. There is no cast, no broken leg – just a vial of antidote slowly dripping into her arm. Her breathing is shallow and her forehead is drenched in sweat. Her hands twist the sheets as they clench and unclench in pain.

'_Of course_', Phantom realizes, '_there'd be panic in the streets if they told the truth._'

The scene sends a prickle of irritation through his veins. Whoever did this to her owes him a wasted trip across half the continent to get here. He can't tease her like this. He can't make any progress towards earning her trust if she isn't awake to see him. If the assassination attempt had been successful, he'd have no other way to find Skaia, and that's not an acceptable outcome.

Phantom doesn't realize his hands have tightened into fists until he hears paper crumple and flower stems snap in the bouquet he's holding.

He's no healer; there's nothing he can do for her. His head tells him he ought to just leave and come back when she's feeling better, because she's useless to him like this.

But his feet think differently, because they walk him over to her bedside before his head has any say in the matter. Phantom finds himself sitting on the side of her bed, watching her as he decides how to salvage the current situation. Her guards are incompetent. Even with their Empress on the brink of death, they've let a thief waltz into her bedroom without setting off a single alarm. It's no wonder she ended up like this.

This heist is going to be a lot more complicated than he thought.

For one, there are other players now, and they're changing the rules. Politics is an ugly, messy business. He hasn't forgotten that his most recent brush with it left nineteen people murdered and one man dangling from the hangman's noose. With the shadows of war brewing ominously on the horizon, Phantom has to ask himself - how much is he willing to risk to gain the legendary treasure of Ereve?

As he wonders, he watches her chest rise and fall with each labored breath and imagines, for a moment, if she were silent and still, his prize lost to him forever.

No. Something inside him recoils at the mere thought.

His decision is made.

"You really aren't going to make this easy for me, are you?" he says with a sigh.

He has an idea, just one, but he really doesn't like it. Final Feint is one of his greatest secrets. It's his last line of defense, a life-saving spell that Phantom invented because he has no desire to die the same way his master did. It takes too much mana and too much concentration to cast it on more than one person at a time, but it will save that person from instant death. Once. And only once.

He's going to regret this. But he traces the five-pointed star in the air anyway and whispers the words to cast the spell, not on himself, but on the sleeping woman in front of him. Instantly, the mana drains from his fingertips to become a warm green glow that envelops her and fades into her skin. It's an odd feeling, to have so much of his own power invested in someone else, but he trusts his own ability to stay alive much more than he trusts hers. He's not about to let his one and only link to Skaia die in some pointless political squabble.

Maybe it's just his imagination, but she seems to breathe a little easier and look a little less pale.

"Better than nothing, I suppose," he says to himself, still irked by how neatly his plans have been derailed.

As he stands to leave, though, a weak pull at his wrist stops him in his tracks. The sudden influx of mana must have stirred her awareness. She isn't awake, not really, but her eyes blink up at him blearily in half-consciousness and her fingers have somehow found their way onto his sleeve.

"Father?" she whispers, and sheer hope in her voice makes him inwardly flinch. He doesn't look that old, does he?

"Not quite," he says gently.

He has the unenviable privilege of watching her heart break in her eyes as wakefulness catches up to her and she finally recognizes her nighttime visitor. Only a brief glimpse, luckily, because she pieces herself together with commendable swiftness for someone still bedridden.

"Phantom," she corrects herself, too exhausted to do anything more to cover her initial slip. Her voice is barely a quiet rasp in her throat. She does, however, manage a shaky smile despite it all. "I thought you were all the way in Helios."

"I came all the way back just to see you," he says, returning her smile with a roguish grin of his own. Thank goodness her commendable mental fortitude works in his favor this time. With emotional crisis safely averted, his brain is finally free to kick into gear, part of it calmly analyzing her unresolved grief and deciding how best to take advantage of it, while another part of his mind maps out how he wants to steer this conversation. First things first – he needs to lay a foundation for her trust, and the easiest way to do that is to establish intimacy. Reaching over to brush the sweat-soaked bangs out of her face, he lies remorselessly, "You had me worried the entire way here."

She doesn't protest against such familiarity, instead closing her eyes and mutely permitting his slight overstep of common social etiquette. Exhaustion has dulled her sense of propriety, but not her quick mind or her frankness. She simply says, "You must want Skaia very much then."

"Of course I do," he admits, because he's played this game long enough to know when to know when to be honest and when to tell half-truths. She won't be fooled if he denies it, so instead, he molds his expression into a look of a carefully concealed hurt. His voice is gently chiding as he says, "But not so much that I care for nothing else. Be careful with your life, Empress. Not even the greatest thief can return that if it's stolen."

There is no response, and he begins to wonder if he's lost her to unconsciousness again before he hears the quiet question, "...speaking from experience?"

She has an uncanny talent for asking questions that entirely derail his planned course of conversation, Phantom grudgingly admits. Three words with so many possible interpretations – is she simply curious about his past, or is she reflecting on her own? The deaths of the previous Emperor and his wife are still quite recent, after all, and nothing brings past deaths to mind quite as well as a close encounter of your own. It's a state of mind he's all too familiar with – not, of course, that he'll ever tell her that.

"No," he finally says, a reply that is untrue in so many ways, but he says it as steadily as the goddess's truth. "I don't steal anything I can't return. And I keep what I steal safe." This line of questioning leads in unpleasant directions. Their conversation is overdue for a change of topic, so he bets on a tried-and-true distraction. Reaching out to gently cup her cheek in his hand, he deepens his voice and murmurs quietly into her ear, "What do you think, Empress? Shall I steal you away?"

"I'm not my own to give away," she answers him with complete seriousness, and it brings a chuckle bubbling to his lips that he has to ruthlessly quash.

"Hence the nature of theft," he says flippantly, dropping all intent to seduce.

He's won his bet anyway, even if it's not how he intended, as she lets out a short laugh, strained and hoarse though it may be, and her eyes flutter open to meet his.

"You're...incorrigible," she says.

"Guilty as charged."

"...but also...very kind."

"No. Just easily tempted by beautiful things," he says. Her assessment makes his stomach turn, despite the fact that convincing her of his good intentions was the original goal of the conversation all along. Something about how they reached this point feels _off_, because she shouldn't be this easy to deceive, not from what he knows of her so far.

But her eyes are already sliding closed again, and her head lolls against his hand as she loses the strength to hold herself steady. There isn't the time for second guessing - he has accomplished what he came to do; the sooner she recovers, the sooner his plans can move forward.

"Good night, Empress," he says, and, on a whim, he leans over her bed and delicately kisses the tip of her nose. It's meaningless – she isn't conscious to see it – but her face, tightened up in pain, seems to relax just a little, and that works for him. Just getting in character, Phantom justifies to himself, and resolves not to think too deeply about it.

He places the luxurious bouquet of roses on her nightstand for the maids to fuss over in the morning and leaves the same way he came, unseen and unheard.

. . .

_"Liar. In the end, don't you do the same things a kind and noble person would?"_

. . .

_Author's note:  
_

_1) It has been a long time since the last update, and I can only apologize. With the RED update, exams, winter break, and the release of Zero, I probably gave up eating and sleeping to Maple. I won't do it again, I promise! Please don't hurt me._

_2) Speaking of Zero, if any of you haven't played through the character storyline yet, I won't spoil too much, but there is a chapter where our favorite phantom thief makes an appearance. I admit that I created yet another Zero just to play through it again because I was too busy squealing in delight to pay actual attention the first time through. It's made me tweak my characterization for Phantom's personality a little, but mostly, I was very happy to find that canon!Phantom is very close to how I imagined him for this story._

_3) At the moment, the entire run of this story is projected to be about 30,000 words, of which I have 14,000 written. Given my tendency to edit and expand, though, the final product could be a whole lot longer. I do have large parts of future chapters written, though, so updates will hopefully be regular and more frequent once more._

_If you liked it, please review! If not, let me know what I can improve.  
_


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